Sitting with Saturday - An Easter Elegy

And we sit in the tension: Between despair and hope Bondage and liberation Death and life.

The here, but not yet. The place where you're almost sure it's finished, but you're willing to give just one more shot. Holding out hope that maybe, maybe this time it will be different. It's the darkest of nights but the awareness that the sun will still rise, eventually.

It's a child learning to walk: still crawling. He has the faith to try a few little steps, only to be rewarded by falling spectacularly on grazed knees. It's the 10th hour of labour -- when the doctor informs you're only halfway. The exhaustion. The despair. Yet knowing what joy will arrive from this pain. The promise of change that has not yet been seen. We can't kill hope: no matter how we try. It rises and greets us each morning: at the dawn of each day. We know sunrise because we know the night -- and without one, we would not long for the other. Is not most of life lived here? The tension of change. The journey of grief. The weight of death. The pain of loss.

The unanswered questions. It feels like they will rip us apart, shatter us into a million pieces, tear us in two as a curtain split down the middle. But through the cracks the light will shine, and we will rise anew - stronger and bolder and more beautiful than before. So let us sit in the here and not yet. Let us sit in the darkness. Let us embrace the pain and the tears. Let us just be. Here. For now. The sun will rise. But not just yet. The tension between bondage and liberation. The truth will set us free. But first, it will mess us up. Let it be messy.

Emily is a renowned community connector, advocate for women, Asset Based Community Development advocate and leader in her local community, recognised for her work as the Local Woman of the Year in New South Wales in 2016. She has delivered training and workshops all around Australia, empowering communities to address gender based violence and discover the inherent dignity and worth in everyone.

See all previous articles and poems by Emily Messieh